Pattern of Upper Gastrointestinal Lesions in Upper Egypt : Clinical, Endoscopic and Pathological Evaluation

Overview

Upper Gastrointestinal (UGI) symptoms are among the commonest complaints for which patients seek medical attention, with the annual prevalence of dyspepsia approximating 25% . Endoscopy holds an important place in the diagnosis of UGI conditions by enabling visualization, photography, ultrasonography, and biopsying of suspicious lesions . It gives a better diagnostic yield over radiology particularly in the investigation of upper gastrointestinal bleeding, inflammatory conditions of the upper gastro-intestinal track like esophagitis, gastritis and duodenitis as well as the diagnosis of Mallory Weiss tears and vascular malformations .Dyspepsia in the absence of any other symptom was the indication for UGIE in the vast majority of patients. Close to 80% of our patients presented with dyspepsia not associated with any other symptom and in 50% of the patients the endoscopic findings were normal \[4\]. Other common reasons for UGIE were GERD symptoms, recurrent vomiting, dyspepsia associated with weight loss and patients with symptoms of UGI bleeding . Gastritis was the most frequent endoscopic finding in our patients, followed by duodenitis .Gastric ulcer was diagnosed more frequently than duodenal ulcers . Taking a biopsy is very helpful in diagnosis in our study. H. pylori colonization of the gut is the main cause of chronic gastritis and the principal etiological agent of gastric cancer and peptic ulcer disease . Gastric cancer was diagnosed, by endoscopy, about eight times more frequently in patients presenting with an alarm symptom like recurrent vomiting, dyspepsia together with weight loss or UGI bleeding .

Conditions

Interventions